Northern Lehigh School District is moving forward with a plan to improve its athletic field complex.

On a 7-0 vote, the school board on Monday approved the agreement with ELA Group Inc. to provide design, engineering, and permitting services for renovation and new construction of the district baseball and softball complex, with a basic services fee of $80,000, with an optional additional services fee of $4,500 for design of the softball outfield renovations.

The total project costs, including all construction, professional services fees, contingency, and other soft costs is not to exceed $2,033,000, or at a cost not to exceed $2,170,000 with the optional softball outfield renovation as part of the final construction contract, as presented and pending legal review.

Director Robert Kern thanked the board for including the softball outfield as part of the renovation project.

“Now I think we’ll have two really nice competition fields that are equal and will be outstanding,” Kern said.

Directors Michelle Heckman and Chad Christman were absent.

In August, the board approved a study for the softball/baseball complex project to be conducted by ELA Sport not to exceed $30,000.

In June, Superintendent Matthew J. Link said that the district had further locked in the cost of the potential project of the baseball/softball fields ($1,720,776) to renovate the baseball and softball complexes, an addition of concession stands and actual fencing around the field, and to actually replace the baseball field “because the drainage there is just unacceptable at this point.”